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Change means opportunity

for those willing to learn

Technology is changing the nature of work
But something is happening beneath the surface that most
consumers are not aware of: the increasingly complex
nature of building a car, and this goes to the heart of the
matter, which is how many years will your car last, and
how long should you keep it? The car is becoming, well,
an appliance. People don't get emotionally attached to an
appliance.

Leasing used to be a confined business model, suitable for
certain business segments, and probably no more than 20
percent of car sales, including fleet and rental business.
Today, more than 30 percent of new cars are leased; for
certain brands, it is more than half. If you lease your
car; reliability, durability and frequency of repair are
practically irrelevant because you are going to return it
in three years. Manufacturers are shortening the product
lifecycle, too. Today, the lifecycle might even be tied to the
length of the average lease.
By Brandes Elitch
CrossCheck Inc. The focus on infotainment, the IoT, dramatic interiors and
offbeat styling have made some cars look dated in only
usually start my articles for The Green Sheet with a few years. Bob Lutz, perhaps the most knowledgeable
a few introductory paragraphs about the wine observer, said some of these designs look like "angry
industry in Sonoma County, where CrossCheck is kitchen appliances." A four-year-old navigation screen
I located. As we say, Napa is auto parts; Sonoma is looks outdated, and new digitized controls and features
wine. This month I'm taking a different tack. introduced every year make the previous model look
obsolete – another reason to turn your car in every three
Some of you know I collect and restore old cars, and even years.
write a column at www.velocetoday.com, a webzine about
French and Italian cars. Today I'll discuss what's happening If you have had issues with a warning light on the dash
in the automobile industry and compare that with the from a failed sensor, you might know that only factory
payments industry. Their common denominator is that franchise dealers have access to the factory software to
misinformation, confusion and downright obfuscation fully diagnose the problem. Small, independent mechanics
abound, which is causing people to focus on unimportant do not. In my case, the local shop diagnosed a problem as a
matters that are not central to what is really happening in crank sensor, but it turned out to be the fuel pump, which
these industries. meant I spent an extra few hundred dollars unnecessarily.

I'll look at the potential effects that artificial intelligence A class action was filed on behalf of independent
(AI) will have on people who have made a career of mechanics against the manufacturers for withholding
selling cars, and contrast this with people selling payment repair information. Another recent lawsuit was filed
processing. When consumers think about the next against two of the largest Dealer Management Systems
generation of automobiles, they think of autonomous (CDK and Reynolds and Reynolds) for conspiracy to
cars, the Internet of Things as it pertains to their cars, and eliminate competition for providing integration with
possibly how they can pay for purchases without leaving dealer data, an alleged antitrust violation.
their cars.
Who will repair your car when a sensor goes out? At some
I've heard commentary that younger generations are not point, a 10-year-old, high-tech car will be a liability due to
interested in driving. However, producing and deploying the cost of diagnosis and repair. A new car has 60 to 100
meaningful numbers of fully functional autonomous cars sensors (projected to reach 200 soon) and 25 to 30 CPUs.
is a huge task that will take many years. Meanwhile, interest They can have up to 10 million lines of code, and high-
in getting behind the wheel and driving somewhere is not end cars have as much as 100 million lines. Cars have a
going to be diminished.
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